When we first started thinking about doing Xbox, we met with Nintendo. We sat down with [late Nintendo CEO] Satoru Iwata and others and we said, ‘This is what we want to do, could we partner? Could we work together on this?’ And basically they said no.

Fries recalled that Microsoft would have handled software and networking duties while Nintendo made the hardware. Considering Nintendo’s history and (near infamous) protectiveness regarding their own IPs, it’s perhaps understandable that they weren’t keen.

After dusting themselves down from the Nintendo rejection, then-Microsoft CEO Bill Gates met with Sony to discuss a similar deal. As we now know, they also said nope.

Fries’ comments were in response to a question on the rumours that Microsoft once attempted to buy Nintendo, though he revealed that if it was ever discussed internally, he never heard anything.

Of course, Microsoft eventually went it alone and came up with the Xbox. While it’s a fondly remembered console, former Xbox director Robbie Bach recently revealed that the original Xbox actually made a loss of $5 billion.

Would Microsoft and Nintendo have made the ultimate console? Or perhaps Sony and Microsoft could have created something beautiful? We’ll simply never know.